A Dark Amish Night (19 page)

   “My father was not a good man. He was a thief and a liar and he was very adept at both. Georgie and I were just children he was still practically a baby when our mother passed. I’m older than Georgie by almost five years, and I always felt responsible for him, but when my mother got sick, I became mother to Georgie full-time. Jack McVey was an on and off again father. He was gone more than he was around, but when Mama died he came back for us. I know now that he came back to keep Mama’s family from taking us. He only wanted us for leverage to get my grandparents to pay him so they could have custody of us. Mama’s family was wealthy. When she ran off with Jack her father disowned her. I never met my grandparents. My mother never talked about them. I only know what Jack told me about them after she was dead.” Pattie Sue took a sip of water from a plastic cup and continued her story. The telling of her story was like a huge burden being lifted from her and it took her back to her youth. All those old feelings of insecurity and fear came rushing out of her as she talked and talked, bearing her soul. 

  
It was the summer of nineteen-seventy-five when Mama passed. She’d been sick for months. Eat up with cancer was what the doctor said. When Jack came back, she’d already been dead for a week. I was doing everything I could to keep Georgie and myself fed and together. The child welfare services were coming to take us when they finally located Jack. I was thirteen and Georgie was eight.

   Jack took us to our grandparent’s house and made us wait in the car. I’ll never forget sitting out in the long driveway of that mansion. Me and Georgie were dying of thirst in the heat. After a while Jack came out of the house and kicked the car. I’d never seen him so mad. He cursed and told us both to shut the hell up. He said we were good for nothing and even our own grandparents didn’t want us. He didn’t care that we were soaked in sweat, thirsty, and starving.

   Later that night, he drove us back to the mansion. He told us to wait in the car, again. When we protested he threatened to beat the tar out of us if we didn’t keep quiet. So we sat in the dark. We were too scared and hungry to do anything else. It wasn’t long before Jack came back to the car. He was carrying a duffle bag full of loot. Jack bragged that he had cracked a safe and found several solid gold bars. For once he seemed real pleased and even took me and Georgie to dinner at Denny’s. I was so hungry I didn’t care what was in the duffle bag.

  
The whole time Georgie and I ate, Jack kept talking about how we were rich now and he was gonna buy us a new house with a swimming pool in a new town. He said he was taking us to Oklahoma. He had friends in Tulsa that were going to help us sell the gold.

    Georgie was so happy about that swimming pool. He told Jack he’d be real good if he could just have that new house with the swimming pool. I knew somehow that we’d never get that house or the pool. I just didn’t care. It was so easy to let an adult be the parent for a change. I was happy to let Jack be the Dad. I hoped for it so much that I just wanted it all to be true.

   When we got ready to leave, Jack heard a police radio going off in the parking lot, something about a robbery on Oakhurst Lane, and to be on the lookout for a man driving a yellow Ford Pinto wagon. We were in a yellow Pinto wagon. It hit me then that Jack had robbed our grandparents and the cops were right outside. Jack panicked. He grabbed Georgie and me by the hand and shoved us into the car real fast.

   For the next several days, we drove and drove. I remember when we crossed the Oklahoma state line. I hoped that meant we would be stopping soon. Then we ran out of gas. Jack said he was out of cash and needed to find a phone. It was a pitch black night outside and we walked for what seemed like miles down an old dirt road. We came across a creek and stopped to rest. Jack left me and Georgie there at the creek. He said he would come back for us. He hid the duffle bag with the gold in it and walked off.

   Georgie was frightened. I sang to him and told him stories. We held each other all night. I’d never been so scared. We waited and waited for Jack to come back.

   The sun came up and almost a whole day passed before Georgie started crying about how hungry and sick he was. I touched his forehead. He was burning with fever. I knew we couldn’t wait any longer. I don’t know how I found the highway again but somehow I did. I was weak from carrying Georgie and from not having eaten anything for days. I collapsed at the edge of the paved highway. I don’t know how long we laid there at the side of the road; all I remember is the clip-clop sound of horse hooves and then being placed in a black buggy.

   When I came around I was in a soft bed covered with bright quilts. Paul and Lily Hollenbeck found us on their way to an Amish community. They said they were moving to Oklahoma from Ohio to start a new life, and Georgie and I could stay with them until we found our family. I was tempted to lie to them, but in the end I just told them the truth. Our mother was dead and our father had left us to die. I told them how our father was on the run and that no one, not even our own grandparents wanted us. After we’d been with Paul and Lily for a couple of weeks, they came to me and told me that our father had been killed while trying to rob a house in a nearby town. At least they believed it was him. I knew it was. I waited for several days before I told Georgie. He’d been real sick and almost died. Lily nursed him back to health and for that I was so thankful to her.

   Paul and Lily had no children of their own. Later I would learn that they’d had children, but all of them died at birth. They took us in and raised us as their own. I was grateful. I didn’t have to take care of Georgie by myself ever again. I learned about and embraced the Amish faith, but Georgie never could give up that dream of the new house with the swimming pool. It was all he ever talked about, and when he was seventeen, not long after I got married, he ran away.

   For several years I didn’t hear from him. Then the letters started coming. The letters would stop for a while and then they would come again. I figured out that Georgie was in and out of jail. When he was in jail I would get letters, and when he got out the letters would stop.

   I loved Georgie so much and he was all I had left of my real family so I sent him what I could, mostly candy and foodstuff. He would send cards and letters telling me about how when he got out he was going to come back and find that gold Jack hid in those woods, and take me away to a new house with a swimming pool. I never believed him.

   Then on the night Eric Hershberger died, Georgie showed up on my doorstep. I was glad to see him, but I was scared. Scared someone might find him with me and then I’d be shunned for fraternizing with a criminal. Eric Hershberger saw Georgie at my place when he came to bring me that pie.

  
Pattie Sue stopped talking then and hung her head and cried. “I don’t know what happened after that. Eric gave me the pie and left. I fed Georgie and told him he had to leave. I haven’t seen or heard from him since that night, and I don’t know where he is now. He drove off in a beat up old pick-up truck and that’s all I know.”

   Quinn sat silent for a few moments. Pattie Sue’s story left him with several more questions. He just needed to think about it for a minute.

   “Okay, Pattie Sue, so you believe that your brother Georgie came back for the stolen loot your father hid some forty years ago?”

   “Yes, that’s why he came back. He searched for it when we were growing up here. He never did find it. It’s all brush land out there now, impossible to get through it.”

   “Yeah, I know real well how hard it is to get through that brush land, and I assume the gold is   hidden in the woods somewhere near the Hershberger farm?”

   Pattie Sue lowered her head again and whispered. “Yes, Sheriff, you’re correct.”

   “You say you haven’t heard from Georgie since the night of Eric Hershberger’s murder, are you very sure about that?”

   “Yes, I’m very sure about that. I’ve told you the absolute truth.”

   “Alright, Pattie Sue, did you and your brother murder Eric Hershberger to keep him from telling others that he saw you with him?”

   “NO! I would never do such a thing. The Hershbergers are like family to me. I would never hurt any of them.”

   “Then did Georgie do it for you or did he do it to keep Eric from getting close to the gold?”

   The room got silent. An almost painful tension hung in the air before Pattie Sue found the strength to answer.

   “I honestly don’t know. God forgive me, I just don’t know.” More silence ensued before Quinn continued.

   “
Pattie Sue, I think we’re done, for now. I just have one more question. Why didn’t you tell me all this sooner?”

   “Sheriff, I was scared. Scared for my brother, and scared of being shunned by the only people in this world who mean anything to me.” 

   “Okay then. You’re free to go, but you are still under suspicion, and I need access to you day and night. So don’t even think of trying to leave. If your bother tries to contact you in any way you will come to me and let me know immediately. I need to know that you understand that completely.”

   “Yes, I understand you completely.”

    Quinn thought Pattie Sue was telling the truth and he turned to the Bishop.

   “Bishop Miller, thank you for coming in. I wonder if I might have a word privately with you.”

   “Sure, let me get Pattie Sue to my buggy and I’ll come back in to talk.” The Bishop picked up his hat and escorted Pattie Sue out of the detainment area. A few minutes later he came back alone to talk to Quinn.

   “Bishop, I need to know if what Pattie Sue said is possible. Could two children be adopted into the community like that?” Quinn was curious for more than one reason.

   “It is rare, but not unheard of and this was forty years ago. Things were different back then. However, I can assure you that Pattie Sue and Georgie did come here with the Hollenbecks as children. My father and mother were close to them and I know Paul Hollenbeck relayed this same story to my father many years ago.”

   “So you can corroborate her story then?”

   “Yes, I believe she has told you everything she knows about her past and her brother.”

   “Good, that’s good to know. Just out of curiosity, can any outsider join the Amish faith?”

   “Again it is rare, but should an Englisher come to the Bishop of a plain folk community and ask to join the fold, the Bishop would interview and pray with them about their decision. Then if the Englisher still felt strongly about it, and the Bishop felt they might be a good fit, the Englisher would then be placed with a host family. They will learn the ways and faith of the plain folk. Then after a time, the Englisher would petition the church to join, then the community would put it to a vote. If the vote goes well, the Englisher would then be a part of the community and would begin their life as an Amish person. It is not an easy life the plain folk choose to live, but it is a rewarding one for us.”

    “What happens when someone like Georgie McVey leaves the community? Could he come back if he wanted to?”

   “That would be a special case for the Bishop and the deacons of the church to decide, but it would not be an easy thing for someone like Georgie. He would most likely have to endure a period of shunning.” 

   “Well, thanks for coming in, Bishop. Tell Pattie Sue I’ll be in touch.” Quinn held the door open and let the Bishop out.

   The sun was up and shining bright in the sky when Pattie Sue and Bishop Miller left the jail house. Quinn was exhausted, but he had only one thing on his mind. Hannah. He had a good reason to see her and this time she wouldn’t send him away. Quinn wished he had better news for Hannah, but he felt closer to finding Georgie McVey. He slugged back a cup of strong, hot coffee and went to relieve Jess. 

A Dark Amish Night

Chapter Seventeen

    Abe and Millie brought Hannah some pumpkins from the farm along with some good news. Hannah was grateful for the rain they’d had through the summer to make a successful crop, but the good news was Millie was expecting her first child.
And so life goes on. I still miss you, Eric. I wish you were here with us, but I’m moving forward the best I can.